Thunderbird---extract embedded images

pixellany · 06-15-2012, 02:04 PM

I did find one relevant thread, but it was for evolution.

The mail format for Thunderbird includes images sent as attachments, but the format is not the normal jpeg. I'm wondering if there is a tool for extracting these images.

(It can of course be done in Thunderbird, but it's a tedious process---save images one at a time)

thanks

Skaperen · 06-15-2012, 02:34 PM

If you extract an image in a different format (such as BMP, GIF, PNG, TIFF) and want it in JPEG format, you can use the "convert" program (in package usually named "imagemagick" or something like that) to convert the image file's format (and do quite a number of other things like scaling it to another size).

pixellany · 06-15-2012, 02:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skaperen

If you extract an image in a different format (such as BMP, GIF, PNG, TIFF) and want it in JPEG format, you can use the "convert" program (in package usually named "imagemagick" or something like that) to convert the image file's format (and do quite a number of other things like scaling it to another size).

I'll be happy to be able to extract in ANY of the common formats!!---Thunderbird is using some kind of encoding that I've never seen before.

Skaperen · 06-15-2012, 07:31 PM

My Thunderbird lets me save and image mailed to be as an inline image, by right clicking on the image, and selecting "Save Image As". For attached files, I right click on the file name at the bottom, and select "Save As". Is this not working for you?

pixellany · 06-15-2012, 09:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skaperen

My Thunderbird lets me save and image mailed to be as an inline image, by right clicking on the image, and selecting "Save Image As". For attached files, I right click on the file name at the bottom, and select "Save As". Is this not working for you?

Yes--that works fine. In my case, I've got some large files with many years of messages. Going thru them looking for images the "normal" way will be a long tedious process.

BenCollver · 06-17-2012, 09:49 AM

You might set up a temporary dovecot IMAP server and drag a copy of you inbox there. Dovecot will store each message as a separate file in your Maildir. Then you can iterate through the files with a shell script, use ripmime to extract the attachments, and collect the images.